Christmas, On Purpose

“The magic of Christmas lives in your heart!” Push the button on stuffed Hallmark Santa's right hand, and that's what he'll tell you.

But what if you're lonely and your heart is broken with loss? Where does that magic go to hide, so elusive and slippery in its gloomy getaway?


Four years ago, almost to the day, I was unpacking moving boxes with not one single friend in the new town I swore I'd NEVER call home. Charlie was throat deep in his new Air Force recruiting assignment that kept him at the office and away from us for half the clock and then some. Jackson was just barely seven months old and dependent on me for...everything. We'd driven four days with three drugged cats across a thousand southern miles to a house we rented site-unseen. The morning we pulled out, I said goodbye to my mother in the driveway of our longest-running family home, and we both clung to each other and wept for the miles about to creep up and camp out between us. I was devastated.

In an act of sheer desperation for happiness, I scheduled a piano tuner to bring our spinet back to life. He came, was cordial, and set to his task. As we made conversation during his work, his kindness to me overwhelmed my heart, and—in my dire loneliness—I softly cried. Even then, in the awkwardness of a stranger's tears, his tenderness toward a hurting one was unrelenting. I will always remember that sweet old man.

About every other day, I would receive a tiny, delicate note from a friend back home—Rita, one of those God-fearing grandmas who's really good at feeding your belly and your soul. She writes in stream of consciousness in a lovely lilting cursive. Little details of hearth and home, every bit as charming as she always is. Rita's letters were life and light, and then one day she called.

I'd been trying to summon the will to decorate our home for the holidays. Jackson was sitting up but not much else, which is funny because I was sort of the same boat with him. I just couldn't bring myself to open a single box of decorations. I missed my family back home and was convinced I couldn't do Christmas without them.

Gently, Rita urged me to set aside loneliness and grief, just for a few minutes. “Pack up that precious baby and take him with you to the Goodwill. Find you a little somethin' Christmasy. It dudn't have to be big or exspensive, just a little somethin'. Put it right over your sink in the kitchen so you'll see it when you're doin' the dishes and remember that I love you and that Christmas will come back in time.”

I scooped up little Jackson and set out for the Goodwill as soon as we hung up. We walked the household goods aisles, searching. I saw it, just as clearly as I had heard the sound of Rita's sweet voice. A tiny little tealight village Barber Shop with snow painted on its bottom edges and the hint of Christmas in its rounded corners. I knew instantly that I would take it home with me. I had such a weird instant attachment to it, as though Rita had secretly come down to Louisiana and placed it there carefully just for me, the way we “hide” easter eggs for our children and then walk openly toward each hiding place and all but point to the hidden treasures because we are just as invested in them finding what's hidden as they are.

I went back a week later and found the Santa votive holder, and I felt the lifeless shape of Christmas twitch and stir in that dark chamber, my broken heart.